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<title>Heroes Need Sleep, Too by soldiermom1973</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27809143">Heroes Need Sleep, Too</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/soldiermom1973/pseuds/soldiermom1973'>soldiermom1973</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>1,000 years (A Reconciliation Story) [65]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect - Various Authors, Mass Effect Trilogy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>End, Gen, N7 Month 2020 (Mass Effect), Paperwork</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 16:54:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>581</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27809143</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/soldiermom1973/pseuds/soldiermom1973</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Allie sacrifices sleep to keep caught up on her paperwork and it catches up to her.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Greg Adams &amp; Allie Shepard, Greg Adams &amp; Female Shepard</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>1,000 years (A Reconciliation Story) [65]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1460416</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Heroes Need Sleep, Too</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for <a href="https://n7month.tumblr.com/post/631981099607785472/n7-month-2020">N7 Month</a> over on tumblr.  The Day 30 prompt was 'end'.</p><p>The title and summary probably make this sound more exciting than it is, but I really struggled to come up with something for this prompt, and titles &amp; summaries always trip me up to begin with.  Still, I hope you like it.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Allie couldn't sleep.  There was a lot of that lately – not sleeping, that is.  At first, in the early stages of the war, Allie spent a lot of her time in her quarters.  There was so much to do she couldn't afford the distraction of idle conversation with the crew.  It was a necessary sacrifice, though, and something she missed.</p><p>As the weeks and months dragged on, Allie started to see her quarters as more of a prison instead of a place to rest.  Both Dr. Chakwas and Liara told her she needed to do her work elsewhere and let her quarter be a place where she could relax and recharge and (hopefully) get some sleep.  So she started carrying a small backpack filled with datapads – briefings and casualty reports and endless amounts of paperwork waiting for her signature.</p><p>She'd wander to the subdeck in engineering and hide for a little, reading through the Alliance reports on ongoing missions.  She'd plant herself high on a stack of crates in the cargo bay to sign off on expense reports and expedited promotion packets.  Once in a while, she'd wander to the cockpit, where EDI would graciously give up the co-pilot's seat so Allie could sit and spend some time in companionable silence with Joker.  They might wind up talking about the last mission or trading barbs about the Council, but not always.  It was probably the one place on the whole ship where Allie refused to do any work.</p><p>Still, even with the change in her routine and scenery, inescapable tendrils of exhaustion would find her.  She'd yawn in the middle of a conversation with Garrus or roll her neck and sigh while checking with Steve about the latest requisition requests.  She tried her best to hide her exhaustion but the people closest to her, who knew her best, could see right through the forced smiles and obligatory laughter.</p><p>“Commander, you should head to bed.”</p><p>Allie startled awake.  She'd only closed her eyes for a second while looking at Hackett's latest orders to head...  somewhere and kill a bunch of Cerberus troops.  “Yeah, yeah, soon.  I just need to finish...”</p><p>“With all due respect, Commander...”  Allie finally looked up and was surprised to see Adams standing in front of her, “...whatever you're working on will still be there after you've gotten some rack time.”</p><p>“Rack time,” Allie let out a sarcastic chuckle.  “I'll be glad when this shit is over, Adams.  You know that?”</p><p>She stood, stretched, and groaned when nearly every joint in her body protested the movement.</p><p>“We all will, ma'am,” he agreed, “but for right now, you really should get some sleep in your quarters.  My neck hurt just looking at you like that.”</p><p>“My neck does hurt, actually,” she admitted, wincing as she rolled her head.  “I guess my pillow would be better than my chin on my chest, hm?”</p><p>Adams gave her a warm smile and gestured for her to head up toward the stairs in front of him.  As Allie trudged up toward engineering, suddenly feeling more tired than she had in weeks, she knew Adams was right – the paperwork would never end until the war did, regardless of the outcome.  And even then, even if they managed to pull off the impossible and beat the Reapers, she was certain there would be some general somewhere demanding accountability for something that got messed up.</p><p>Yeah, the paperwork would keep until she got a little rack time.</p>
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